The continued division of Germany's government between Berlin and Bonn has long been a contentious issue. But now lawmakers seem to have started a process that could lead to a complete move of government to Berlin.

The parliament's budget committee this week called for a review of the current situation, which essentially splits government between Berlin and the former West German capital, Bonn.

 

Committee members have also asked the government to submit an annual report on the costs of keeping to seats of government. The report will also have to include information on whether the Berlin-Bonn divide prevents more effective government.

 

"The slope from Bonn to Berlin has become even more slippery," Petra Merkel, a Social Democratic member of the committee from Berlin, told Berliner Zeitung.

First cut in the tax for 34 years leads Government's measures to stimulate spending. At a cost of £13bn, says Treasury, it could save the high street

VAT will be reduced from 17.5 per cent as early as this week as Gordon Brown and Alistair Darling gamble £18bn on a Christmas tax-cutting plan to rescue Britain from recession.

In a pre-Budget report (PBR) tomorrow loaded with huge political significance for the Prime Minister and the Chancellor, VAT will be cut - for the first time in 34 years - within days, in time for the first big Christmas shopping weekend.

The cut will be at least 2 per cent, possibly to 15 per cent, where it will remain for a "holiday" of one-and-a-half to two years, bringing some relief for millions of families as the economic downturn worsens.

This would take £10 off the average Christmas present bill of £384 and bring welcome respite to the beleaguered high street, where stores have been forced to bring forward the season's sales to get people spending.

Jacqui Smith, the home secretary, is to arm police with 10,000 Taser stun guns in an escalation of the government's fight against violent crime.

Smith will unveil plans tomorrow that will enable all 30,000 front-line response officers to be trained in firing the electric guns at knife-wielding thugs and other violent suspects.

Smith said yesterday that £8m will be made available to all 43 police forces in England and Wales to buy the new 50,000-volt weapons.

She said their use will be extended from small units of dedicated firearms officers to up to 30,000 police response officers across the country.

Civil war loomed among France's feuding Socialists after a party leadership ballot ended yesterday in a virtual dead heat between the two female contenders amid accusations of cheating and calls for a rerun.

Martine Aubry, the 58-year-old mayor of Lille, declared victory by a margin of only 42 votes that was immediately contested by Ségolène Royal, her bitter rival, who demanded another ballot.

The official results gave Aubry, a former minister, 50.02% of the 134,784 votes cast by party members, compared with 49.98% for the 55-year-old Royal, the party's presidential candidate last year.

Royal's supporters complained of "irregularities", vowing to challenge the result. "We contest these results," said Julien Dray, an MP and Royal backer. "There are things that don't add up. The only possible solution is another vote."

Thousands of Icelanders demonstrated in Reykjavik on Saturday demanding the resignation of Prime Minister Geir Haarde and Central Bank Governor David Oddsson for failing to stop a financial meltdown in the country.

It was the latest in a series of protests in the capital since the financial meltdown that crippled the island's economy.

Hordur Torfason, a well-known troubadour in Iceland and the main organiser of the protests, said the protests would continue until the government stepped down.

"They don't have our trust and they are no longer legitimate," Torfason said as the crowds gathered in the drizzle before the Althing, the Icelandic parliament.

A separate group of 200-300 people gathered in front of the city's main police station demanding the release of a young protester being held there, Icelandic media reported.

A judge in Kosovo has ordered a 30-day detention for three suspected German intelligence agents arrested in connection with a bomb attack on a local EU office. A German expert government intrigues might be to blame.

Lawyers of the men said prosecutors were trying to link their clients to "acts of terrorism," punishable with up to 20 years in prison.

 

"Three German citizens, suspected for the explosion... have to stay one month in detention" the Daily Express reported Sunday, Nov. 23, according to the AFP news agency.

 

The Kosovar paper added that the Germans were "suspected of conducting a criminal act of terrorism."

 

Attorney Adem Ademi told the German dpa news agency in Pristina that "some documents" identifying the suspects as agents of Germany's Federal Intelligence Agency (BND) "were found and presented as evidence," but he expressed doubts about the documents' authenticity.

 

European automakers shouldn't count on special treatment from the EU, Industry Commissioner Verheugen said. But one German state has demanded climate protection rules be watered down to protect carmakers -- and jobs.

The European Union's planned support package for the 27-member bloc's industrial sector would not provide automakers with special subsidies, Guenther Verheugen, the bloc's industry commissioner, said in an interview on Sunday, Nov. 23.

 

"We have a single industrial policy in Europe and it has clearly left behind the use of subsidies," he told German broadcaster NDR. "And there won't be a reoccurrence of the subsidy mentality of the 80s."

 

Verheugen added that the only industry rescue package considered by the EU was one involving the expansion of credit lines provided by the European Investment Bank. Such new loans would help carmakers adopt climate-friendly technology and produce cleaner cars.

The EU will give 1 billion euros to poor farmers in non-member countries over the next three years. While member states agreed on the matter in principle, there was some disagreement on where to get the money.

EU budget ministers, meeting in Brussels, reached the deal late Friday, Nov. 21, according to diplomats cited by German news agency DPA. The money will be released in three phases up to 2010 with an installment of 270 million euros ($337.4 million) due this year.

 

"There's agreement -- and Germany supports this -- to make available this money for food production in the poorest countries," said German Deputy Finance Minister Joerg Asmussen.

 

A poll has shed light on which candidate the public believes should be nominated this week as the new cabinet representative of the rightwing Swiss People's Party.

The party will pick a successor to outgoing Defence Minister Samuel Schmid on November 27 from among nominations made by party sections. Cabinet elections follow on December 10.

According to a joint poll published Sunday by the Matin Dimanche and SonntagsBlick newspapers, Zurich parliamentarian Rita Fuhrer was the overall preferred candidate, backed by 15.9 per cent of respondents.

She was marginally - 1.4 per cent - ahead of party figurehead Christoph Blocher, who is also in the running.

The poll found that more than two-thirds of 1,055 respondents did not want the former justice minister to be re-elected to cabinet.

Drug laws, pensions and planning permission are on the agenda for Swiss voters in the next exercise of direct democracy on November 30.

A poll conducted by the gfs.berne polling and research institute on behalf of the Swiss Broadcasting Corporation, swissinfo's parent company, and published on Wednesday shows that voters may well play safe.

Proposals to change the existing state of affairs as well as moves to introduce new laws both seem doomed to fail when they come to a nationwide vote.

Voters appear set to approve the new narcotics law passed by parliament earlier this year, which includes legalised prescription of heroin for severely dependent addicts. The law enjoys the support of 63 per cent of those questioned, the same proportion as in a previous poll in October.

The rightwing People's Party called a referendum to overturn parliament's decision, but only 21 per cent of respondents said they would follow its appeal. All the other major parties support the new law.

While a sizeable majority is in favour of legalising heroin prescriptions, a vote on a proposal to decriminalise cannabis looks as if it will be much tighter

Communists in St Petersburg have called on the region's governor to award a medal to a Russian who claims he shot down Senator John McCain's military jet in Vietnam

They have hailed as a hero Yury Trushyochkin, 70, a former Soviet officer who claimed last week to have fired the missile which brought down Mr McCain's plane as it flew over a bridge near Hanoi in 1967.

Mr Trushyochkin served in a mixed Soviet-North Vietnamese missile unit during the Vietnam war, which was guarding the bridge near a power plant under attack from a 20-strong strike force whose pilots included Mr McCain. The Soviet-made missile blew off a part of one wing of Mr McCain's plane and he ejected upside down moments before it crashed - suffering injuries which have plagued him ever since.

"This sincere Cold War hero is now living in St Petersburg and thinks he simply did his duty," the St Petersburg Communist group declared. "But in reality he defended the USSR and Russia, helping to guard socialism in Vietnam and teach a lesson to the future Number One enemy of Russia."

In an interview last week Mr Trushyochkin told a tabloid newspaper that he had been responsible for firing the missile, and had glimpsed Mr McCain soon after he was pulled from the lake in which he landed. "His hands were covered in blood and he was in a state of shock," he said.

Barroso sees improved competitiveness

Co-ordinated national stimulus programmes and accelerated spending of regional aid funds are the central elements of a European Union economic recovery plan to be unveiled on Wednesday by EU policymakers.

José Manuel Barroso, European Commission president, will set out the case that the EU can kill two birds with one stone by adopting expansionary fiscal policies that not only pull Europe out of its recession but also improve its long-term competitiveness.

"Spending to beat the recession must be smart spending," Mr Barroso told a conference in Lisbon on Friday. "We must invest in those areas that are critical to our future competitiveness - essential infrastructures, research and innovation, clean technologies to support the transition to the low-carbon economy, energy efficiency, and education and training."

According to some German officials, the Commission will propose that EU governments approve a fiscal stimulus package worth about €130bn ($164bn, £110bn), or 1 per cent of the 27-nation bloc's gross domestic product.

Obama's speech was on the same lines. It's good in both cases.

In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes

Austria will continue to be governed by a grand coalition of its two major parties after those groups agreed to share power at a meeting Sunday.

That means Werner Faymann, 48, of the SPOe Social Democrats will take over as Austria's chancellor. His party will rule together with the OeVP conservative Austrian People's Party.

  

Bildunterschrift: Großansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift:  Werner Faymann is expected to become chancellor

Austrians went to the polls Sept. 28. But with no clear winner in that election, the parties have been negotiating about power sharing the whole time.